drewharwell

drewharwell, 1 month ago to random

New: I talked to Trump Media investors about their shares' value getting cut in half. A tree remover in Oklahoma who bet basically his whole nest egg told me, “This isn’t just another stock … I feel like it was God Almighty that put it in my lap" https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/04/14/truth-social-investors-faith-trump/

drewharwell, 2 months ago to random

New from me on Truth Social:

• Trump's site made $4M in revenue last year, little more than average McDonald's (but less than Chick-fil-A)
• Executives got $600,000 "retention bonuses" even though company lost $58 million last year
• Trump Media called this a "ridiculous hit piece" even though it's all their own numbers
• Stock just opened down 9%

Gift link: https://wapo.st/3JcnUEG

drewharwell, 2 months ago to random

With Threads' entry into the fediverse, I'll be posting and playing around with two accounts now.

This one, on Mastodon.social: @drewharwell

And this one, on Threads: @drewharwell

How are y'all planning to do it?

drewharwell, 2 months ago to random

New: Trump Media, launched after the insurrection, faces a rebellion of its own. Four lawsuits in three states involving its co-founders and former money man could imperil its long-delayed merger - and a potential Trump lifeline, given his $500M in legal fines. These court filings, I tell you, are truly something else: raw, personal and very, very angry

Gift link here: https://drewharwell.com/truth-socials-civil-war/

drewharwell, 2 months ago to random

Why you should care about the TikTok bill:

"Once national security is invoked, it gives almost unfettered latitude for the government to sidestep First Amendment concerns, because now this is almost like a wartime footing"

“It does feel in that sense that we’re going back to some kind of Cold War-like media environment, where we’re now going to erect boundaries in the service of national security"

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/03/14/tik-tok-bill-constitutional-questions/

drewharwell, 2 months ago to random

New: Trump last year asked Elon Musk if he wanted to buy Truth Social. The idea went nowhere, but the former president and the billionaire have continued to talk more than was previously known, incl. in Palm Beach. Musk needs tweeters, and Trump needs cash https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/03/12/trump-musk-truth-social-sale/

drewharwell, 2 months ago to random

New: The TikTok bill will probably sail through the House tomorrow - the first time a chamber of Congress has greenlit what could become a national social-platform ban. But in the Senate, it'll likely get slow-walked or stopped. "A forced sale set up to fail” https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/03/12/tik-tok-bill-house-vote/

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

Scoop: Trump Media's co-founders — big former Trump boosters from "The Apprentice" days — are suing the company, claiming Trump and his allies are trying to cut them out of their shares, now worth ~$300M

Lawsuit could imperil Truth Social merger — one of Trump's few financial lifelines after ~$500M NY fraud fine

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/02/29/truth-social-lawsuit-trump-media-founders/

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

New: The FBI’s new tactic: Catching suspects with push alerts. The ubiquitous phone feature has powered a surveillance technique used to catch suspected kidnappers and pedophiles. It’s also fueled fears of a ‘privacy nightmare’ at a time when abortion is criminalized. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/02/29/push-notification-surveillance-fbi/

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

The Biden executive order we reported on Monday is being issued today: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/02/26/biden-sensitive-data-china-ban/

Will block bulk sale of biometric, financial, genomic, geolocation and health data to China and other "countries of concern." White House called it "the most significant executive action any President has ever taken to protect Americans’ data security"

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

New: It's not a coincidence that deepfakes of girls and women keep going viral on X. The platform has become the internet's most prominent dealer in nonconsensual porn. The fake "leaked" video of Bobbi Althoff was seen 5 million times in 9 hours - 25x the viewership of all the deepfake porn sites, combined https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/02/22/x-twitter-bobbi-althoff-deepfake-porn-viral/

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

Latest version of my newsletter is out with free links to some of my recent stories on chips, truths and TikToks: https://drewharwell.com/the-12-billion-everything-machine/

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

Kremlin troll farms and spin doctors churned out thousands of social media posts and articles to divide and destabilize Ukrainian society, according to a big cache on Moscow's “information psychological operations." Incredible reporting by Catherine Belton https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/02/16/russian-disinformation-zelensky-zaluzhny/

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

New: The U.S. government's subsidies for semiconductor factories are really kicking off now. Billions for companies that make the little digital brains inside cars, missiles, dishwashers, satellites, phones and fighter jets https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/02/19/biden-billion-chip-grant-new-york/

drewharwell, 3 months ago to random

I've moved from Substack for obvious reasons to a new newsletter at https://drewharwell.com.

Still free, and I'll be sharing gift links to all my new stories there from now on.

Would love for you to subscribe!